Eyelash Viper

Marty’s photo of the day #1734: It’s Photos of Endangered Edens Week. In the past I’ve avoided posting photos from my books, and instead featured photos that didn’t quite make it. But the more I think about it, there really isn’t any reason I can’t post my published pictures. After all, they’re copyrighted, and the low-resolution Internet versions of them will never match the quality of the high-resolution versions—printed on glossy art paper—in Endangered Edens.

One of my favorite “characters” in my new book is Fred the Eyelash Viper. He lived on a big leaf, just a few feet from our cabin’s porch, in Costa Rica. Fred was just a baby, and he kept us company the entire time we were in the country. Yes, Fred is venomous, but that didn’t worry us. Snakes would rather not waste venom on something they can’t eat, though they will use it in defense.